heroic qualities are needed to overcome the superficial circumstances of our life, and transmute them into occasions for that humble, obscure heroism which God alone apprehends and rewards. The freedom of the writer from all the stereotyped phraseology of sanctity in doing this work, and his innocent sympathy with everything cheerful, pleasurable, and lovable in Nature and human nature, only add to the power of his teachings. These "Recreations" of the "Parson" will, to the generality of readers, produce more beneficent results than could have been produced, had he given us his most carefully prepared sermons,--for they connect religion with life. Nobody can read the volume without feeling the moral and religious purpose which underlies its graceful and genial exhibition of human character and manners. The common objection to clergymen is, that they are ignorant of the world. No sagacious reader of the present book can doubt that this parson, at least, is an exception to the general rule; for he palpably knows more of the world than most men who have made it a special study. RECENT AMERICAN PUBLICATIONS RECEIVED BY THE EDITORS OF THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY. Afloat and Ashore. By J. Fenimore Cooper. Illustrated by Darley. New York. W.A. Townsend & Co. 12mo. pp. 549. $1.50. Silas Marner, the Weaver of Raveloe. By the Author of "Adam Bede." New York. Harper & Brothers. 12mo. pp. 265. 75 cts. The Works of Francis Bacon, Baron of Verulam. Collected and edited by James Spedding, M.A., Robert Leslie Ellis, M.A., and Douglas Denon Heath. Volume I. Boston. Brown & Taggard. 12mo. pp. 539. $1.50. History of Latin Christianity, including that of the Popes to the Pontificate of Nicolas V. By Henry Hart Milman, D.D., Dean of St. Paul's. Volume VIII. New York. Sheldon & Co. 12mo. pp. 561. $1.50. Chambers's Encyclopedia: A Dictionary of Universal Knowledge for the People, on the Basis of the Latest Edition of the German Conversations--Lexicon. Illustrated. Parts XXIX., XXX. Philadelphia. J.B. Lippincott & Co. 8vo. paper, pp. 55, 65. 15 cts. each. The New American Cyclopedia: A Popular Dictionary of General Knowledge. Edited by George Ripley and Charles A. Dana. Vol. XII. New York. D. Appleton & Co. 8vo. pp. 788. $3.00. The Life of George Washington. By Washington Irving. In Five Volumes. Vol. V. Illustrated. New York. G.P. Putnam & Co. 12mo. pp. 434. $1.50. The Crayon Miscellany. By Washington Irving. New Illustrated Edition. Complete in One Volume. New York. G.P. Putnam. 12mo. pp. 379. $1.50. Another Letter to a Young Physician; to which are appended some other Medical Papers. By James Jackson, II. D. Boston. Ticknor and Fields. 13mo. pp. 179. 80 cts. The Partisan Leader: A Key to the Disunion Conspiracy. By Beverly Tucker, of Virginia. Secretly published in Washington in the Year 1836, but afterwards suppressed. New York. Rudd & Carleton. 18mo. paper, pp. l95. 50 cts.